DEVELOPMENT OF HIGHLY REGENERATIVE EMBRYOGENIC CELL SUSPENSIONS OF ‘NANJANGUD RASBALE’ (SYN. ‘RASTHALI’, MUSA, AAB, SILK SUBGROUP) AND TRANSFORMANTS WITH AMP GENE

‘Nanjangud Rasbale’ (syn. ‘Rasthali’, AAB, Silk), one of the popular banana cultivars of Karnataka State in India, is seriously threatened by Fusarium wilt caused by Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. cubense (Foc). There is no report of the development of highly regenerative ECS cultures from this cultivar using floral meristems.
Highly regenerative ECS were established from floral meristems, which developed into embryos in 45 days and germinated in 60 days.
One ml of the ECS produced 2080-2960 somatic embryos, which produced around 1500-2000 plantlets.
After standardising different transformation conditions, the ECS (0.5 optical density) was transformed with the AMP gene cloned from onion seeds, through Agrobacterium-mediated transformation.
Somatic embryos developed and regenerated on the same selection medium with 0.7% germination.
PCR, RT-PCR and Dot blot assay of the regenerants showed integration of the AMP gene in 10 out of 17 plants tested.
Further evaluation of the established transgenics is in progress.

V International Symposium on Banana: ISHS-ProMusa Symposium on Global Perspectives on Asian Challenges

S. Mohandas, H.D. Sowmya, R. Manjula, K.Y. Pratibha, S. Meenakshi, K.M. Ajay

Agrobacterium tumefaciens, Dot blot, Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. cubense, geneticin, immature male flowers, RT-PCR, somatic embryos

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2011.897.27